Optical communication systems have many advantages over older, more established technologies and are increasingly replacing those technologies in many applications. Optical fiber is the workhorse of the typical optical communication system, and the low loss, light weight, small size, flexibility and high intrinsic bandwidth of optical fiber help make optical communication systems more desirable than competing systems for the communication of both of digital and analog signals. Of course, there is more than fiber in an optical communication system. A typical system includes an optical transmitter that generates an optical beam and modulates the beam with an electrical information signal. The optical fiber, perhaps spanning a continent, then propagates the modulated optical signal to a receiver that demodulates the optical beam to recover the electrical signal. Optical fiber not only carries the signal on cross-continental journeys, but also interconnects the separately packaged components that make up a typical receiver, transmitter or repeater of the optical communication system. For example, included in a typical transmitter package are an optical beam generator and a modulator, each typically packaged separately, and which are in optical communication via short lengths of optical fiber.
Optical fiber feedthroughs are an important feature of each discrete package and of the overall transmitter package, providing a transition from the environment external to the package to the internal operating environment of the package. One important function of an optical fiber feedthrough is to prevent loads placed on the portion of fiber external to the package from being transferred to the fiber within the package, where the delicate transitions from fiber to the optical device can be readily damaged. For example, one standard becoming prevalent in the industry requires that the fiber external to a package can be loaded to 1 kilogram (kg) without substantially transmitting the load to the fiber core within the package, such that the optical interconnect to an optical device within the package is not adversely affected.
As is understood by those of ordinary skill in the art, there are many known designs for optical fiber feedthroughs. However, such known feedthroughs are often unduly complex, may weaken the fiber, are time consuming to install, or do not adequately prevent the load applied to the fiber from being transferred to the delicate optical fiber interconnect within the package. A simple and economical optical fiber feedthrough for preventing selected loads from being transferred to the fiber within the package would be a welcome advance in the art.
Accordingly, it is a principal object of the present invention to address one or more of the disadvantages of the prior art, and to provide an improved optical fiber feedthrough.
Other objects will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in light of the following disclosure.